Page 14 of A Plaid Case of Loving Ye
And Nicola tumbled over the side.
Really, there was no other option, what with the heaving and rocking and rolling. One moment she was upright, holding the bowline, and the next she was crashing down atop Ramsay, pushing him under, his head ramming her stomach hard enough to push the breath from her lungs moments before the water would’ve done it for her.
She came up sputtering.“Fookthat’s cold!”
One of Ramsay’s arms snaked around her middle, and she was relieved to see the other holding firmly onto the boat. He began to chuckle. “Ye didnae believe me?”
St. Crystal’s patella! She could feeleverything. Aye, the water was frigid, and her dress—and shoes—were now sodden and heavy, but Ramsay was strong and she was plastered against him.
Now she was breathless for an entirely different reason.
She reached for his shoulders to hold herself up, then thought better of it and grabbed for the boat as well, causing it to rock. That was when Marigold peered curiously over the side of the vessel and Ramsay’s laughter died.
“Nay, ye stay where ye are,” he commanded the goat. “My hands are already full—no’ that I’m complaining, mind ye—and I’ll no’ be able to saveyetoo!”
“Ye dinnae have to save me,” Nicola grouched, trying to pull herself up and over the side. “Unlike my sister, I ken how to swim.”
“Do ye? Fully clothed? In icy water? Here, let me help ye.”
She was too cold to answer. Instead, her lips pressed together and she concentrated on using her waning strength to lift herself.
And then, she was flying once more. Ramsay had shifted, planted his hand beneath her bottom, andpushed. He reallywasremarkably strong, eh? She went up and over the side of the boat then felt his hands move to her thighs and knees which still dangled over the side. With him pushing and her pulling, she managed to sprawl gracelessly on the bottom of the boat.
“Now,” he commanded, “hold Marigold.”
“Hold Marigold,” she mocked in a snide tone, and heard an answering chuckle from the bow of the boat.
Less than a minute later, the missing oar was heaved over the gunwhale, then she felt the whole boat began to creep once more toward the island where the fortress-turned-convent sat. The pace wasn’t as quick as when Ramsay had been rowing, but ‘twas respectable.
Nicola was content to rest against the bottom of the rowboat, letting the sun warm her as she petted the now-docile ungulate.
Eventually, he spoke. “Which sister cannae swim?” Except, it sounded as if he had something in his mouth.Ich itha cannae sim?
It took a moment to work through. She imagined him holding the bowline between his teeth as he stroked. “What does it matter?”
He spat, and the boat slowed. “Because ye’re lazing about like a queen as a naked man tows ye through freezing water, so the least ye can do is entertain me.”
She grinned and stacked her free hand behind her head. “Like a queen, eh? I suppose ye should call meyer majesty.”
“I would.” The reply was faint enough that she doubted she was supposed to have heard it.
The boat began to move again, St. Dorcas the Ever Petulant rising ever closer, and Nicola considered his request. In the last few days, she’d spoken with him more and more often, although she’d shared little of her past, because he couldn’t reciprocate.
Instead, they’d laughed. They’d joked. They’d spoken of the present and her work, and his plans, and the nuns, and the tasks needing to be completed. She learned he was a good man, an honorable one, and very charming.
Her brother-in-law was one of the King’s Hunters. Laird Kenneth McClure had come to Oliphant Castle at the beginning of the summer, searching for a fellow Hunter. The only clue he had to the missing man’s whereabouts was a message the man—McIlvain—had left for him:Beware the Oliphants.
Kenneth had taken that as proof her clan had somehow been involved in McIlvain’s disappearance and had begun his investigation. He’d been joined enthusiastically by Nicola’s youngest sister Leanna, and after they determined the Oliphants were innocent of wrongdoing, the pair of them were married.
But Kenneth had described the missing man well enough that Nicola had taken one look at Ramsay and knownthiswas McIlvain. Was he a laird? Kenneth had never said. But despite his charm, he was a Hunter, one of the King’s elite men, capable of dangerous violence.
And he had reason to suspect the Oliphants were worth avoiding.
Beware the Oliphants.
Nicola knew the time was coming when she’d have to tell him what she knew of his past. Hewasa good man, despite his distrust of her clan, and he deserved to know who he was, even if he never remembered.
But when she did, what would he think of her? No one had told him her clan name, and here he was asking for specifics about her family…
